Preparing Your Organisation For An Everyday Video Shoot.

It’s an everyday video shoot, your video concept is all signed off, we have your interview questions ready and we know exactly what we are going to film.

It’s time for the big day where we visit your organisations premises and create some amazing video content with you! We’ve got the plan, experience and equipment to make this happen, but it works both ways. Here are some points to consider in regards to your organisation that helps portray your brand in the best light!

It’s not everyday that you get a film crew coming to your place of work, so this is your opportunity to make the most of it and to really show off your organisation as best you can. It also saves a lot of time on the day to be fully prepared for an everyday video shoot, so we can spend more minutes filming instead of improving things on location.

Time & Effort

One of the first things you need to realise is that you get back the amount of time and effort you put into something, and this is especially true when it comes to video production. It works both ways between the video creatives, and the people who’s story we are trying to tell. We can only make things look so great on camera, but its up to you to ensure that locations and staff members are at their best on the day. We can do our best to just turn up and shoot, but there will be a big difference in the resulting footage if we have prepared the location and subject accordingly.

It’s never just a couple of hours of filming. To craft imagery that is effective takes time, so when we say it’s a day of shooting, we really mean it. A typical shoot day for us is 10 hours, not including travel time. So we will typically arrive on location for 8am and we will stop filming at 6pm and start packing up. If we need to stay the night in order to ensure we arrive in good time, then we will do so.

Before We Arrive On An Everyday Video Shoot

Opening Times

It would be good to know the earliest time that we could potential enter the location and also the latest time that we could leave. It doesn’t necessarily mean that this will be when we will arrive/leave, it’s just good to know so that we can schedule accordingly and we know how much time we have to film and pack down the equipment.

Permissions

Do you have the full permission of your building owner or other parties in the area to film? It’s always good to check and get permission in writing before we arrive, otherwise it could be a waste of time, money and resources if they decide not to release the location.

PPE

Does our crew need to be wearing any protective clothing to work safely at the location? It would be a shame if we couldn’t access the location due to simply not having the eight footwear or eye protectors. It’s always good to ensure that we either have our own PPE or there is PPE waiting for us to wear at the location to save time.

Tidiness & Cleanliness

We know more than anyone that things at the office can get messy when you’re busy. People don’t always have time to clear away their lunch or to tidy up paperwork. However it’s very important that you give your place of work a good tidy and clean before our crew arrives. The final video will be viewed by your target audience, so it’s imperative that your place of work is portrayed in a way that reflects your brand. Imagine that your biggest client is coming to visit your place of work that day.

Also, don’t pick a tiny plain white office for us to film an interview in, it’s boring and does not represent your organisation or what you do.

Branding

Is all the physical branding up to date at your organisation? The last thing we want is for a shot of your old logo or old company name to feature in the video. This could potentially confuse your target audience when they see the final video. This includes your staff uniform or PPE if they wear them.

Staff

Interviews

For an everyday video shoot, we usually carry out interviews with staff members about a particular topic within the organisation. We will send the questions we would like to ask them beforehand, but its important that the interviewees don’t try and write a script to read out. The answers need to be natural and come from the heart. It’s good as well not to have too many people in the room with the interviewee so they can feel comfortable.

We will need a quiet room with minimal interruptions, the bigger the room the better and with carpet and soft furnishings to absorb any sound echoes. Sending photographs to us of any potential filming areas would be really useful.

Depending on the type of content we need to capture, we typically like to schedule and hour per interviewee to ensure that everyone is sufficiently warmed up and the audio and lighting is as best it can be,

Staff Appearance

How your staff looks on camera is just as important as the location if not more so. We need to make sure that your staff members give the right impression to your audience, especially if they are being interviewed. So please ensure that they look tidy, well dressed, and behave in a manner that you would be happy for your clients to witness. Staff members should not wear any clothing with obvious brand names visible. They should also avoid striped clothing as this can confuse our cameras sensor. And of course, if we are filming on a green screen, don’t wear green….

Background Extras

Your staff members are what make your organisation function and some of them may be customer-facing. The last thing we want is to show a large place of work with nobody working in the background. Not only is it an unrealistic representation of your organisation but it makes it very difficult to get good shots. Your organisation is busy, so we need to show your audience that. Therefore we may need staff members to be flexible on the day and work in the background of our shots. If a lot of your staff members work from home, it might be a good idea to ask them to come in for the shoot day to bulk up the numbers of staff in the shots. It’s all tailored to portray your organisation in a positive light.

Staff Permissions

Some of your staff members may not be happy to be filmed, so it’s good practice to inform everyone at the organisation that we will be arriving and what we need from them. If they do no wish to be filmed, then all they need to do is tell us.

Activities

The main reason we are at your premises on the day is to film content! So it’s important that we actually have something to film. If there is a key activity that we need to feature in your video, but it can’t be filmed because you aren’t prepared for it, or the person who does that activity is working from home that day then it is a missed opportunity and will incur costs if we need to come back and film again. It is therefore important that we define these activities and ensure that everyone involved is prepared to carry it out.

Noise levels

There’s a good chance that on an everyday video shoot, we will need to record some form of sound, whether that be an interview or just general ambience. Therefore it would be good to know in advance about the noise levels in your working environment. Our microphones are extremely sensitive, and can pick up even the slightest sound. If that sound is unnatural, distracting or just far too loud then your viewer can miss your message. We do our best, but we can’t magically remove every sound we’ve recorded. So we would generally need people at your workplace to be quieter than normal on the day.

Building Work

If you have any building work going on in or near your organisation then it would probably be best to wait until that has finished before we turn up to film. It can seriously delay the shooting schedule if we have to wait for work noise to finish. 

Loud Environments

If your organisation is used to working in a loud environment, it would be useful to identify any areas that may be quieter than others. If possible, it would be beneficial to remove the noise altogether. This could mean that some of the workforce need to stop for an hour or so, (with enough notice), you can have a plan for your workforce to go on lunch or work in another area during the sound critical sections of an everyday video shoot.

Noisy Appliances

There can be other factors as well. If it’s an office or similar, is there any air conditioning? Can it be turned off? Any noisy fridges or water coolers?

Public Areas

Does your organisation work in public areas? Are there a lot of members of the public? We need to know so that we are prepared to deal with the sounds of curious passers by and also for GDPR compliance.

Infrequent Noise Proximity

Is your premises within a busy flight path or road? We need to know so that we are prepared for the audio issues and also factoring in the extra time it would take to capture audio to a good standard.

Lighting

I know what you’re thinking, you’re the film professionals, surely you should bring the lights? Well yes of course, we will bring our lights but we need to know about the available lighting at your premises. 

Interior Lighting

First of all, can your lights be turned off? Or are they based on movement? It’s great that modern buildings are being made more energy efficient, but it can be a nightmare when trying to light a shot in a specific way and you have no control over the artificial light in the room! It’s good as well to identify any malfunctioning or blown light bulbs before we arrive so that all areas are evenly lit and the flickering lightbulb doesn’t make your premises look like the start of a horror movie. Please also make sure that they are all the same colour temperature. It’s quite long winded to explain, but the rule of thumb is to make sure that all lightbulbs in the filming area are either white daylight or orange tungsten colour so that we get consistent and accurate colour throughout the whole room. 

Windows & Glass

Another important thing to note are windows. If you have any areas in mind an everyday video shoot, you should avoid having any windows in the background of the shots. Windows lead to outside, and outside has the brightest light source available to us, our sun. Unless we bring in extremely powerful lights or factor in the time to put ND on the windows, then our cameras cannot expose for both inside and outside at the same time. If we aren’t able to avoid a window, we may need to draw the curtains and place a thick towel over the rail to block out as much sunlight as possible. 

Windows can also reflect the image of the lights and film crew and make them visible in camera, so it’s worth avoiding windows and glass in the background of a shot all together.

Power

We usually have the ability to power most of our equipment via battery but after a long everyday video shoot our batteries can become drained and we will need mains sockets to either power our equipment for the remainder of an everyday video shoot and also charge our batteries. Therefore it would be good to identify plug sockets for us to use before we arrive and ensure that they are powered!

Schedule

During our pre-production process, we’ll come up with an efficient schedule that makes full use of the time we have on site. We will need to know the approximate start, end and break times of your employees. We’ll send this to our main contact(s) at your organisation before an everyday video shoot. It’s important that all key individuals are aware of this schedule and are able to keep to it. There really is no time for them to finish a meeting or finish writing an email. Remember you are paying for us to be there and every minute where we are not filming is costing your organisation. We typically concentrate on capturing the interviews we need first as these form the basis for the different contextual shots we will get throughout the day.

Arriving To An Everyday Video Shoot

Security

Is the security team aware that we are arriving? Are we and our vehicle(s) on their list of scheduled visitors for the day?

Loading & Unloading Access

When we arrive on site, you’ll notice that we have a lot of equipment with us. We’ll need time and a good place to unload that equipment. If there is a loading bay, or rear entrance which leads to larger doors then that would be ideal. We also need some good directions on how to get there in our vehicle. We suggest using WhatThreeWords.

Parking

We ask that if our clients are able to provide a parking space for us to please do so. This is mainly due to the time it wastes on the day. We don’t want to spend time driving to an exterior car park, purchasing a ticket and then walking to the shooting location.

Basecamp

Once we have unloaded our equipment, it’s always good to have a “base camp” to set up and store our equipment throughout the day so that we’re out of the way. We can also charge batteries here and backup footage. If you are able to provide this then it will save us bringing the equipment with us to every area of the location that we need to film and save time. Ideally this would be a secure lockable room/area on the ground floor.

Sign In / Site Induction

Do we need to sign in when we arrive at the location? Typically how long does this take? Is there any way we can speed up the process by giving our crew details in advance? Do we need a site induction or safety briefing before we start an everyday video shoot? If so let us know so we can factor this into the schedule.

An Everyday Video Shoot Summary

As you can probably tell, this guide is focussed on being efficient and maximising our time. So we need to have all the relevant permissions to film in place. Here is a little checklist that, while not essential, if ticked off can really help get the most out of a film shoot:

• Study the filming schedule that we send you, can you see any clashes with the interviewees and their schedule?
• We need permission to film and make security aware of our arrival.
• Select an area to unload and predetermined place to safely store our equipment.
• Book a parking space for our crew to minimise the time spent parking.
• Tidy the areas that will feature in the film and have up to date branding.
• Brief your staff about what’s happening on the day so they look representable on camera.
• Plan to have visually interesting activities for us to film.
• Pre-select volunteers to make your organisation look busy.
• Try to identify and reduce common loud or disruptive noises before we arrive.
• Pre-select a large interview location that’s quiet and out of the way with no windows or glass in the background.

If you do all of this for us, not only will we be eternally grateful, but you will get much more quality footage out of the day and that is all everyone wants to achieve.

If you have an upcoming shoot with us, then you can fill in our location data sheet here.

I hope this guide has been useful and if you have any questions then just drop us a quick email! Looking forward to meeting you on set!